How no laundry day makes me the smelly kid . . . (as promised)

Before I came on this trip, I received hundreds of bits of advice. One thing that I was told over and over and over again by SAS alumni and others who had traveled extensively – pack light, don’t bring many clothes, bring old clothes, lay out all the clothes you really think you’ll need and bring half. I took this to heart. I brought old clothes and definitely not too many. All my clothes easily fit into one suitcase. Although, to tell you the truth, from what everyone told me, I thought that I would still end up with way too many. I think I had around seven pairs of pants (only two being jeans), five skirts, and probably twenty five shirts (tee shirts, tanks, and sweaters). THANKS A LOT FOR THE ADVICE GUYS!!! NOT!!!

Contrary to what I was told by SAS alumni, people do dress nicely on this ship sometimes. And, I’ll tell you the truth, I’m ok with the standard SAS sweats and t-shirt uniform most days, but sometimes after feeling so gross for so long, I’d love to throw on an amazing outfit and look gorgeous. AND, days before every laundry day I find myself with absolutely nothing clean to wear. Then, when laundry day finally comes, I have to wait another three days to get my clothes back, without even my gross, dirty clothes available to throw on in a pinch. It’s always interesting to find the right balance between sending as much as possible to get clean and leaving out enough clothes to wear for the next three days. During those three days, I hope that my clothes are sitting by my door every time I come back to my room. One morning when I had been waiting for my laundry for a particularly long period of time, I heard a thunk outside my door at 5 a.m. and imagining that it might be my laundry jumped out of bed. And, luckily it was. I have never been so excited at 5 a.m. (except maybe at Christmas).

Sometimes I just bring a bunch of dirty laundry with me the shower, but then it takes days to dry and is never as clean and fresh as sending it through the washer. Although, lately, things that I have sent to the wash have come back smelly and miraculously stained. So, maybe, it was good advice not to bring nice clothes. I have also ruined a lot of clothes with all this adventure hiking that I’ve been doing. But, I definitely wish that I had brought more clothes.

And the reason that I bring this up, because I haven’t seen a laundry day in nearly two weeks and I’m DYING here. I have resigned to the fact that I’m going to be doing some laundry in the shower tonight.

Really, it’s just the joys of traveling around the world on a ship. I’m really not complaining, just amusing you with the little problems I face here at sea. Here’s to being the smelly kid . . .

Still smiling,
Amber